Love, Sex aur Dhoka - The Review

I was excited about the release of this movie for the longest time. Not a single known actor, and most importantly, the movie was shot in digital format - Security cameras, spy cams, digital video cameras - the whole shkabang. Finally, taking full advantage of the Vodafone Tuesday offer, I dragged my mum along to see the movie with me (no one else was available!)

I'm glad I took mum along with me, because anybody else would have been an irritant. She dozed off within 15 minutes of the movie, and I was caught in attention by every move the genius Dibakar Banerjee was making.

Love, Sex aur Dhoka challenges mainstream Bollywood movies, and their portryal of love. Dibakar has divided the movie into three parts, each part dedicated to love, sex and dhoka respectively, though all three parts have elements of each. All three stories and characters are interwoven with each other.

WARNING: Super Spoiler Alert. If you haven't seen the movie, don't read any further! Skip this section completely!

The first section is an out and out challenge to Bollywood's notion of love, how everything works out for the hero and heroine, against all odds. The young aspiring movie director who falls hopelessly in love with the daughter of a rich businessman, sounds cliched, doesn't it? The young man is a huge follower of the Yash Raj school of filmmaking, and his diploma movie 'Mehendi tere naam ki', is a tribute to 'Adi' Chopra. He falls in love with the lead actress so much so, that he even begins calling her Simran. So far, everything seems like the perfect Bollywood plot, even the leads begin to think so. Dibakar has juxtaposed real life versus the cotton candy Bollywood life wonderfully in the first section. However the love story ended, Dibakar simply left it on the audience to interpret and choose what life they'd like to live.

The second story is, I think, the best combination of all three parts - love, sex, aur dhoka. A broke 'MBA', a store clerk, and things that go bump in the night. What I took away from this section was that in such times, who do you trust? The person you love? Does he/she really love you? Can you let yourself go completely? Do things truly work out in the end? This part had some of the most risque dialogues and 'bold' scenes.

The third is all about 'dhoka'. A jaded dancer wants to take revenge against the Punjabi pop star Loki Local (the best performance in the movie!) who used her in exchange for an appearance in his music videos, which he never goes through with. Fate brings together the dancer and an equally jaded 'sting operation expert'. Together they plan a sting operation against the pop star. What happens next? Find out!

SPOILERS END

The movie is gritty, gripping, and brutal at times. There isn't a boring moment in the movie, it engages you from the beginning to the end. In terms of movie-making, it is truly revolutionary. It has some of the best dialogues and superb music. Dibakar has created some very memorable characters, and in my book, they are going down alongside heavyweights like Hanz Landa, Michael Corleone and Darth Vader!

It is unfortunate that Dibakar is a director from Bollywood. This movie will not be sent for Oscar consideration, nor will it receive the Filmfare for the Best Movie. He will of course be given a Critics award for his efforts, while Shah Rukh Khan laughs his way to glory and wins best of show. Sigh.

So here's 4/5 for Dibakar Banerjee's Love, Sex aur Dhoka. Watch it for pure cinematic excellence!